No Teamster is getting "ripped off" by the Mafia anymore, and haven't been in decades. Even the government agrees with that. You have to read many of these anti-union books with a grain of salt, because many of them are proven to be nothing more than thinly-veiled anti-union propaganda disguised as serious analysis. Follow the money trail, and you might just be a bit shocked, is my point.
One might actually make the point that it is the
non-union sector who has been getting ripped off by the corporate Mafia in this country for the last couple of decades, with help from pro-business politicians who care more about their lucrative pay-offs (read: campaign contributions) than the future of the middle class in this country.
Let's face facts: FedEx Freight employees and other non-union employees including Overnite employees enjoy what they enjoy in the way of pay and benefits and work rules because of the union influence in the LTL industry, and the desire of management to keep the union out.
And more power to y'all. But that ride may end one day if the union's influence in the trucking industry continues to decline, and there is no further pressure on your management to keep wages and benefits high.
Want an example? Look at the "Right-To-Work" South, which has the lowest wages and highest statistical number of workers with little or no health insurance. In these states, the unions face a very uphill battle to organize workers, and it is reflected in the overall low average wages and benefits numbers.
Market forces. The union is a market force, and that cannot be denied.
As to union multi-employer pensions, the only union multi-employer pensions that have failed were in the coal and steel industry, which suffered drastically due to overseas competition and other economic forces, like high energy prices, low demand and extremely cheap foreign competition.
Never has a Teamster multi-employer plan failed, nor is that likely given the numbers, even in Central States, which has made up much of the losses it suffered in the early 2000's.
Now, go to the PBGC website, and take a good long look at how many single-employer private pension plans (in other words, the kind of pension that FedEx Freight and Overnight offer) have had to be taken over by the government. Many of these failed due to corporate reluctance to keep them funded, lest they "cut into profits unduly". They just let the Amercian taxpayer bail them out, and who suffers?
The workers who depended on the promises made by their employer that they would have a monthly retirement check, guaranteed.
Thanks, but I'll take my chances with a multi-employer fund any day of the week, where the risk is spread out amongst many companies and many industries. The odds are with me far more than they are with those of you who are relying on a single-employer pension.
Hey, even a single-employer pension is nothing to sneeze at in this day and age, where many companies like IBM have decided to get out of traditional pensions for good, and have put the entire risk burden onto the worker. But read your plan details carefully: most plan have langauge that say that they can end or alter the plan at any time and for any reason.
And it's been done. Ask around. Hell, ask any former G.I drivers what happened when their pension went bye-bye. Sure, you will get out of it what you have into it, but that's it. After that, it's 401(k)'s or nothing.
As for reading material, read "Sweatshops On Wheels" by Dr. Michael Belzer. It explains the influence of the union on the trucking industry, and how and why politicians and corporate interests conspired to cut the throat of the union in the trucking industry, and where that has led us...
Thanks for your time...
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